American Express raised the annual fee on its Platinum Card — by $200, to $895 — and the world seems to have kept spinning.
That’s a big difference from earlier this year, when Chase raised the fee on its Sapphire Reserve — from $550 to $795 — and the internet nearly lost its mind.
What’s the difference? I’m not exactly sure, given I don’t have either of the cards myself, but from what I can tell from the discourse online, Amex cardholders seem to think the new Platinum Card comes with enough new goodies to make up for the higher fee.
Some — very vocal! — Chase Sapphire Reserve cardholders felt differently back in June. They crashed out, devastated, and vowed to cancel their cards.
For the last decade or so, the Amex Platinum and Chase Sapphire Reserve have had well-heeled urban millennials in a chokehold, turning them into rabid point hounds, desperate to be the ones to toss down their cards at the dinner table to collect all the rewards.
It’s also thrown airport lounges — once the private sanctuary of the most elite frequent fliers — into cattle calls, with lines out the door waiting for a free croissant and mimosa.
For both the Amex and Chase cards, the new perk structure changed the cards from being largely based on getting points when you spend to a sort of coupon book. This is a big change! And it means that you have to weigh carefully whether the coupons are for things you actually want to buy.
For example, the new Amex perks give you $75 per quarter in credit at Lululemon. That seems great to me, but not to someone who doesn’t want to shop at Lululemon. The same goes for the $400 at Resy (all you have to do is use your Amex card at a restaurant that uses Resy), or the $200 credit to buy an Oura ring, an Uber One membership, or a Walmart+ membership.
So if you don’t buy it, you’re just leaving perks money on the table. (In the subreddit for the card, people are discussing schemes of how to get the Lululemon credit as a gift card to sell for cash, or flipping the Oura rings on eBay. I’m sure Amex doesn’t want you to do this!)
Reading through a few guides to the new perk system, the advice seems to be roughly the same: This card is still a good value IF the perks are ones you want. And whether these perks appeal to you is totally about your personal preference and lifestyle.
For some people, they’ll happily use all the perk coupons, which add up to more than the $895 fee — and that doesn’t even start to include the points system for spending money, which is largely unchanged. For others, this means the fee isn’t worth it, and they might want to switch to a purely travel rewards card. Hakuna matata!
My colleague Ben Bergman is one of the people who is thrilled about the new perks. He told me it’s better than ever for him. “I already used my Resy credit last night,” he told me. “I’ll also use the Lululemon and $400 hotel one very easily.” He also goes to Equinox gym, for which he gets a $300 credit. All in, he’s getting back way more than the $895 fee.
Ben, I’m happy for you, but I’ll also admit that this is making me feel like a bit of a loser because I don’t go out to eat or travel enough to make the card worth it for me.
I always felt bitter that I had missed the boat on the early glory days of the Chase Sapphire pointsapoolza, and I was secretly thrilled when the Chase card got worse (for some people). I was hoping the Amex would be like this, to give me some schadenfreude reward points, but sadly, this doesn’t seem to be the case.
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